May 11 Daily Devotional

Scripture for Day 11—Ecclesiastes 3:16–17

¹⁶Moreover, I saw under the sun that in the place of justice, even there was wickedness, and in the place of righteousness, even there was wickedness. ¹⁷I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and for every work.

Devotional:

Time and again Qoheleth hammers home the point that God not only does what he wants, but that there is nothing that you can do about it. 3:14 was one such verse: "I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. And God does it, so that people fear before him."

For the human creature, this means that we either resign to God's kingship or raise our fists toward heaven in a struggle of futility. Our text (3:16-17) opens up a somewhat new line of thinking. Humanity's "fate" is in the hands of God, and he will not negotiate his right to govern. However, the grand scheme of God's design which no one can fathom is well able to include every kind of evil perpetrated under the sun. For by juxtaposing the words of our text with 3:9-15 (which speak of absolute divine sovereignty), the author is inviting us to investigate the bewildering reality of God's decrees in light of an incredible array of wickedness and injustice in the world of man.

3:16 claims that where you would expect some measure of justice and integrity (i.e., legal system, perhaps even the cult and the sanctuary) you find corruption and sin. So the Teacher has yet another shock in store for us. The conventional law of retribution (jus talionis) does not work. People take what is not theirs, and they get away with it. The foundations of justice are out of sorts.

Give a man just a little power, and he will manage to abuse it, and those who are on the receiving end of oppression are ordinarily helpless, caught in the dragnets of a system that simply does not favor the weak and powerless. Qoheleth sees the Darwinian principle of the survival of the fittest at work in human society, converting everything into a power play dictated by those who hold sway over the underprivileged, either by hoarding all the resources, or by commanding force, or both.

One might say, "Is it really that bad?" If you believe in the doctrine of human sin, this should come as no surprise, and we must remember that God sees more than we do about the way things are under the sun. The Psalmist once vented his frustration over injustice: "Behold, the wicked bend the bow, they have fitted the arrow to the string to shoot in the dark at the upright in heart; if the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?" (Ps. 11:2-3). The answer is: The righteous can do nothing.

But there is a God in heaven, and he will set right what has gone wrong, and, says Qoheleth, he "will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and for every work" (3:17). God will surely settle all accounts justly in the end. There will be a judgment, and Jesus Christ will introduce a new heaven and a new earth in which righteousness dwells forever. He appeared in human flesh to become the target of God's wrath for us. He is our only chance to stand before the divine bar of judgment. We must let him open our eyes to whose return all of history is rushing.

The author of these devotionals, the Rev. Martin Emmrich, is an ordained OPC minister (Westminster OPC, Corvallis, Oregon) as well as the author of Pneumatological Concepts in the Epistle to the Hebrews, a book on the teaching of Hebrews on the Holy Spirit. We are happy to make these devotionals on Ecclesiastes and other passages of Scripture available to you.